


Repercussions

by lasairfhiona



Series: Fiona Saga [8]
Category: Highlander: The Series
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-22
Updated: 2011-04-22
Packaged: 2017-10-18 12:27:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/188881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lasairfhiona/pseuds/lasairfhiona
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fiona finds about Methos and the Horsemen and understands something from the past a bit better</p>
            </blockquote>





	Repercussions

**Author's Note:**

> Heed the warnings of violence and rape. I don't want to hear about it if you read this and complain...

Seacouver 1998

Joe knew the minute he came through the door she was home. He could smell the beeswax from the candles she always had burning around the house and a hint of the perfume she always wore still hung in the air. He heaved a sigh of relief, he was glad she was home even if he dreaded telling her about the events that unfolded the past couple of days. He had no idea of how she would react, and he didn't really want to be the one to turn her world as she knew it upside down.

"Fee?" Joe called as he walked into their bedroom.

"Joe!" Fiona responded excitedly as she came from the bathroom.

"Hey, you're home early," he commented as they met half way across the room and embraced. "You weren't due back from Ireland until next week."

"I missed you," she whispered against his chest as he wrapped her in his arms. She pulling him down for a kiss when she noticed his worry lines were deeper than when she left. "Joe? Is everything okay?"

Joe sighed and led her to the bed, "Come on, let's sit down. This is going to take a while."

"Joe, what is it? What's wrong?" Fiona questioned. As she watched his expressions she knew only one thing could make him look so grave. Someone close to them had lost their head. "Duncan? Richie?" She questioned, saving the one she feared the most for last, "Methos?"

Joe had been shaking his head as she rattled off Duncan and Richie's name. When she came to Methos' after a moment's hesitation, he looked down, he couldn't look her in the eye.

"Goddess no, not Methos!" She cried.

Joe pulled her close, "Fee, no it's not that. He's still alive." Her sigh of relief made him smile, but not for long. He had more to tell her and he wasn't sure how she'd take the news about her oldest friend. "There is something that you need to know."

"What is it then?" she asked, having a feeling she wasn't going to like what he was about to tell her just by the tone of his voice and his demeanor.

"Cassandra's back in town."

"Ugh…" Fiona interrupted. Cassandra was one friend of Duncan's she never cared for. They had words for women like her who used gifts given to them the wrong way, but they weren't for polite company and she'd only use them in private with others who felt the same about Cassandra, especially since she seemed to be able to do no wrong in Duncan's eyes.

"I know how you feel about her, but you have to hear this," Joe told her. "She's headhunting… She ran into Methos and went for him. It was all Duncan could do to keep her off him until Methos could get out the door. Apparently she told Mac that Methos was one of the horsemen. As in the Four Horseman." Joe continued to tell Cassandra's tale of Methos and Kronos and the part of her past with them.

Fiona sat quietly wrapped in Joe's arms trying to absorb everything he was saying. At first she sat, tensed in horrified disbelief that the man she'd known for nearly a millennia could possibly be like that. Sure his scruples left a lot to be desired. He could never be called a boy scout like Duncan but to be what Cassandra claimed. Never. Then it was as if some one had lit a light, and understanding set it, something that happened a very long ago, suddenly made sense.

Joe felt the tenseness flow from her body and looked down at her petite form in his arms. "Fee?" He questioned.

"It all makes sense now," she said calmly, more to herself than to him, as she put the pieces together.

"What?" he asked, his curiosity was piqued as to what she could be talking about and what would suddenly make her relax in light of the news he'd just shared with her. Would he get another glimpse into her past and subsequently Methos's as well?

"Something happened a very long time ago. Something Methos said that didn't make sense until now." Fiona explained rather cryptically.

"You are going to tell me, aren't you?" Joe questioned, leaning back and lifting her chin so he could see her face.

"Yes, but first I want to know. Duncan. How is he handling this?" Fiona asked, concerned for her friend. She knew Duncan's nature wouldn't be as accepting of a darker side to someone he considered important to him. It had taken him a long time to deal with the dark side of himself brought out by the dark quickening.

"He's not," Joe answered, shaking his head.

"And you?"

"I don't know. I'm trying to make sense of it all. To understand it. I don't condemn him. I know it was different time. He was a different man. I think that's what Mac doesn't get," Joe tried to explain, but found it hard to put into words. It was something only experience could explain.

"And you do?" Fiona asked gently.

"In a way. Vietnam. I was there and I still have to live with what I did and what I saw," he admitted quietly, holding her close to keep his own ghosts at bay.

Fiona nodded. She knew of Joe's ghosts. She'd held him when he woke from his nightmares dripping with sweat, just as he'd done for her.

"You aren't surprised by this, are you?" Joe asked, wondering about the calmness he felt in her. When she said, "No, I'm not." He asked, "Why?"

"It happened a long time ago," she said settling back in his arms. "I need to tell you about it from the beginning before..." Fiona's voice drifted of for a moment. She swallowed and continued, "We'd been traveling through France for a several weeks and we were tired and dirty. We needed a few days in one place to just relax but we hadn't reached the monastery yet. We'd been riding through this forest and as we came over this hill it opened into a clearing with a small pond...

~~~~~

1062 France

"Look!" Fiona pointed.

Methos followed her direction and saw the pond she was pointing to. The pond glistened through the break in the trees. They were tired and dirty, and it would be good to rest for a while and wash off the filth of the road.

Urging their mounts forward, they stopped short of the bank. Pausing only to hastily remove the saddles and tether the horses, they stripped out of their clothing and plunged into the pool breaking the shimmering surface.

Methos was the first to surface in yelling in shock at the coldness, but as he re-emerged from the crystalline depths, he struck out toward the center. Fiona dove in, feeling the water wrap around her like a silk cloth, clinging and sliding along her body as she surfaced. At that moment, she felt more freedom than she'd felt in years, maybe centuries.

"Fee, come join me." When she heard Methos call to her, she nodded and began to swim toward him. He headed toward her, splitting difference between them. He pulled her into his arms, kissing her as their legs intertwined. Forgetting, in their desire, the need to keep afloat, they sank below the surface. The need to breathe made them surface, sputtering and laughing.

The lovers dove and swam around each other until they tired then slowly swam back to shore. The sun had warmed the grassy banks and the pair laid their tired, but exhilarated, bodies in the sun to warm and renew their strength from their playing and swimming. Fiona woke a while later and rolled so she could watch Methos as he slept. Methos, the oldest immortal. Her Arrawn. There was a bond between them that even she was unable to explain.

Leaning over, she kissed the back of his neck then proceeded to make a trail of kisses down his spine.

Deciding on one last swim before dark, they struck out and swam side by side occasionally stopping to steal a kiss or two. When they were in waist deep water Methos stopped and pulled Fiona to him holding her against his taller frame, enjoying the feel of her against him. It wasn't very often they had this kind of peacefulness to enjoy one another.

Fiona pulled back and held stone still.

"What is it?" Methos asked. He'd seen that look on her face before and knew that something usually happened and it wasn't always good.

"Shhhh..." she whispered, concentrating.

"Fee?" he questioned.

"Arrawn. We have to go!" Fiona pulled loose and headed to where their clothes hung drying in the fading sun.

"What is it?" Methos asked as he followed Fiona.

"A darkening. Something's coming, and it isn't good." She told him, as they scrambled to put on their clothes.

~~~~~

Joe interrupted her story. "You mean you could feel something was going to happen?"

"Yes. At the point in time, it was easier to tune into natures rhythm, and feel the shifting."

"Can you still do it?" he asked. He was still curious about her abilities, even though he just accepted them for the most part.

"Not like I used to," she answered, shaking her head. "Too many people, too many buildings. I can still pick up, so to speak, vibrations from the people I care about and who are close to me. I get a disjointed feeling when something is going to happen." Fiona explained. "Kind of like the dreams I had when I first came to town."

"Do you feel it for everyone?"

"No, mostly just you and Methos these days. Sometimes if something is "really" wrong with Duncan or Richie but not often."

"Hmm, interesting," Joe, muttered against her hair.

Fiona smiled. She knew Joe's nonchalance about what she'd told him was a facade and would someday end up in her chronicle, and that was okay, as long as Joe was the one doing the recording.

"You were saying," Joe urged her to go on.

Fee smiled at his encouragement to continue again but the next part would be as hard for her to tell as it would be for him to hear, "After we threw our clothes on we quickly untethered out horses and mounted without saddles..."

~~~

The horses spooked as they grabbed for the reins. Calming them enough to mount, leaving their saddles behind, they galloped across the short expanse of the clearing to the tree line. They knew they would have a better chance to get away from whatever Fiona felt if they were on horseback rather than foot.

They slowed slightly as they approached the tree line looking for the exact entrance to the path they emerged from earlier that day. Branches whipped across their faces scratching them as they rode, not bothering to take the time to move them out of their way.

"Arrawn, wait!' She tried to tell him but he galloped off up a clear path to fast to hear her words.

Fiona followed, prodding her mare on faster to catch up to Methos. They were half way up the trail when their path blocked by the raiders. Fiona wheeled her horse around hoping to go back the way they came only to find their escape was blocked as well.

"Well, well, well. What do we have here?" One of the men asked.

Methos looked at Fiona, silently telling her to go along with him. "Please sir," he said almost meekly. "We are pilgrims on our way to worship at the monastery," he said tightening his cloak around him to hide his sword, knowing Fiona had done the same.

The same man came forward and rode a circle around the two of them. "Hmm, now why don't I believe that? I think you are more than just poor pilgrims. Pilgrims don't have such fine horses. "He rode closer to Fiona and pulled her off her horse. Hauling her, fighting all the way, across the saddle in front of him, before she could get her sword free. "Let's see what you really are."

"Let her go!" Methos demanded as he turned his horse to follow, pulling his sword from where it was sheathed in his cloak, leaving all pretense that he was a meek man behind.

"Tisk, tisk. That's not very nice. Don't you know who you are talking to? I am Jacques du Prix and this is my territory. I 'own' these lands. And no one crosses them without paying a tithe to me."

"I don't give a damn *who* you are! Let her go!" Methos demanded, swinging his sword toward anyone who got within range of his horse as he maneuvered to get closer to du Prix and Fiona

"She's your pet, is she? Well I'll just have to see how good she is." Jacques taunted sizing up Methos. "A man like you must have a woman who can hold her own."

Methos cringed at the iciness of the words. He remembered uttering those same words to others a long time ago. A cold chill ran through him. He knew what was coming next. He knew what he'd done after uttering words like that. He needed to get Fiona away from that bastard. He had to keep her safe and untainted from the world he used to inhabit. And now he was on the opposite side. The woman being taken was his. Not a slave to be shared around the camp with his brothers but his own friend, lover, mate. It had been along time since he had been willing to think about loving a woman as completely as he loved her. But she was a part of him and the 60 years they had been together were the best in a long time. He wasn't willing to let that animal hurt her!

Jacques nodded to others and Methos found himself trapped with more riders between he and Fiona and the bridle of his horse being held. He watched, unable to move his horse forward, as du Prix threw Fiona to the ground and jumped off after her before she could scramble more than a few feet away.

"Bring him." Jacques demanded as he reached down and pulled her to him, wrapping one arm around her waist and half lifting her off the ground.

The others drug Methos from his horse and half carried him and half drug him to where du Prix was standing holding Fiona as she struggled against him kicking out in hopes of doing damage to his legs and anyone who came close. Methos fought all the way, but the more he fought the more he found himself being restrained. Although he, himself, was a tall man these men were several inches taller and a much heavier build than he was. Outweighing him by at least 50 pounds.

"Leave her alone." Methos demanded once again, knowing his attempts would fail but unable to stop himself from making them. He hoped in some small place in his mind that his efforts would prove to be a distraction and give Fiona enough of a chance to escape du Prix's grasp.

"You don't give up do you?" du Prix sneered at Methos, before turning to his men to order, "Gag him. I don't want to hear him while I sample his woman."

Methos struggled as they tied a dirty stinking cloth across his mouth. His fighting did nothing against their greater bulk.

Fiona struggled harder and was awarded with a strike to the face before she was once again tossed to the ground. He grabbed her and pulled her against his body and began to kiss her face. She struggled, kicking and biting whatever she could make contact with. Jacques had enough of her struggling and ordered two of his men to hold her still for him.

They grabbed her and held her by the arms as she continued to kick out. Methos, seeing her fight, tried even harder to gain his freedom, to no avail.

du Prix watched as she fought against his men and once again slapped her soundly to calm her. She cried out and went still for a moment. He used this break in her fight to get close and rip her tunic down the center seam, exposing her to him and the rest of his men.

"Very nice." He slurred as he grabbed her breast with his filthy hands and squeezed it, hard.

Methos cringed as he watched her being forced to submit to that animal. He was unable do a damn thing to stop them and his fighting against their strength was useless.

Fiona continued to fight in silence. Not letting du Prix have the satisfaction of hearing her scream. She was no match for du Prix's sheer size. He held her down and his stinking mouth ravaged hers and his rough hands grasped, pulled and invaded her body. When she though she could take no more of his invading hands, he pulled back leaving her to be held by his men while he yanked up her skirts and dropped his trousers. With no warning, he bent over her and rammed himself into her body. She suppressed a scream as searing pain ran thought her.

Methos watched in horror as that monster ravaged Fiona. He knew her soul was screaming even if her voice was making no sound. Screaming at the pain, and screaming for her death. For death was the only release from the pain she was suffering now.

When Jacques was finished with Fiona he stood and pulled his trousers back on, before kicking her several times both in her gut and back as she rolled away to avoid the blows, until she lay near death. "Woman, they can't take it, she's not even worth giving to my men to play with," he spat as Fiona lay in a crumpled ball on the ground. The last thing she remembered before everything faded to black was hearing du Prix taunt Methos, "You're next my skinny friend. Let's see if you are any better than you wench there."

~~~~~

Neither said anything else for a long while as Joe held her trembling body. Feeling cold to her bones at the retelling, she basked in the warmth of his body surrounding her.

"You okay?" Joe asked when he felt her shivering stop.

"Yeah, I just didn't realize how much telling about it would still bother me after all these years. Just hold me for a while."

"Always." Joe pulled her tight against him. They were laying more than they were sitting on the bed. Pillows propped them up, while she used him as a pillow. He smoothed her hair back and away from her face, feeling the silky ness of it as it glided past his fingers. She was so absorbed in her memories and reactions to them that she didn't register the pure hatred radiating from Joe's body, for which he was grateful. At that moment, legs or not, he could have cheerfully ripped the hearts out of the men who hurt her never mind that it had been almost a thousand years ago. He hoped some where in this piece of history Fiona was telling him, she would tell him Methos had done just that.

Fiona had stopped shaking and when she sighed, he knew she was almost ready to continue her story.

"It was dark when I came to. I was in a room with a single lamp to light the room sitting on a nearby by table. I was on this big bed covered with quilts and skins..."

~~~

She didn't know how much time had passed while she lay there, still in her torn clothing. The blood had dried leaving dark reddish brown stains on the once cream colored cloth. She pulled the tunic tighter around her body and huddled under blankets that had been piled on top of her. Her body shook uncontrollably from both the cold and from shock. When she felt the presence of another immortal and heard the door creak open, she called weakly from the bed, "Arrawn?".

"Oh good you've finally come around, I'll get your companion for you," the quiet slightly accented voice informed her.

"Who..." she started, nervously, to ask but he was gone before she could finish the question.

It wasn't much longer before the door opened again. "Arrawn?" she called again.

The bed sank and strong arms gathered her close "Fee, shhh, I'm here," he soothed, when she began to cry.

"I wasn't sure you were still alive."

Methos continued to hold her while she tried to talk between sobs. When she finally quieted, "I have clean clothes, and you are being brought warm water to clean up with."

Fiona just nodded against his chest and allowed him to help her out of her clothing.

~~~

The monks delivered the water and retreated, leaving Fiona in Methos's care. He helped to pour the steaming water into the copper tub and then aided Fiona into it. She sank into the water, letting it cover her hear until Methos was afraid she would let herself drown. Just as he was about to pull her to the surface, she came up and reached for the rag and the bar of lye soap. He watched as she scrubbed her skin until he was sure he would find blood on the cloth from the force she used. He understood what she was doing, and the desire to cleanse her skin from their filthy touch. He'd done the same thing earlier. Only he did scrub until he bled and even the blood flowing couldn't rinse away the filth of what had happened to them. At that moment he vowed never to tell Fiona what had happened to him after she 'died'.

His past had come back to haunt him and in the process tainted the one person he wanted to hide the ugliness from. He would comfort her as much as he could and then he would leave so no more of who he was could touch her. He obviously hadn't made enough reparations in his life yet.

When she was finally clean and redressed she allowed Methos to wrap a blanket around her and they sat huddled together by the fire. She didn't know if the tremors that racked her body were from the cold or from the shock of what had happened to them.

Their benefactor and rescuer slipped unseen but not unfelt into the shadows, leaving the savaged couple to find the warmth and healing they needed from each other. He could remember the days when he'd held a woman in his arms through the night.

~~~~~

"Wait, who was this rescuer/benefactor of yours?" Joe interrupted, wondering who the other Immortal had been

"Darius." Fiona said quietly.

"Darius?"

Fiona smiled, "Yes Darius. Of course, I had no idea he was a legend then."

"So how did he rescue you?"

"It appeared that Jacques du Prix had left us for dead along the path where he and his men had..." she paused, not wanting to say the words again, "well left us. Darius came along and recognizing us as immortals packed us into his cart and took us to the small monastery where he was expected for the evening. I'm guessing he was on a pilgrimage through France, when he came upon our bodies. It turned out that while Methos had removed the knife from my chest there was another knife in me that kept me from reviving when they thought I should have. He and Darius discovered it when they were moving me from the cart."

"So they removed it then rather than arouse suspicion by carrying a body with a knife sticking out of it into the monastery. We were there for a couple of days before I felt well enough to travel again. And once I was well enough I discovered that Methos had been making some decisions without me..."

~~~~~

"Fee I want you to go to Paris with Darius." Methos told her coldly, leaving no room for her to argue his decision or at least he hoped she wouldn't.

"Why?" she demanded. She didn’t like people making decisions for her. She hadn't, not for a very long time and she wasn't about to let Methos start now.

"He can help you, that's why."

"How can a Christian priest help me more than you can? Have you forgotten what the Christians did to my people? And you expect me to go with 'him'?" Fiona spat her disdain for Christians evident.

"Damit, I can't help you," he exploded. "You don't understand," he finished weakly.

"So tell me. Tell me why after the years we've had together that you would abandon me now," she paused, "after what happened to us..."

"What happened to us is exactly *why* I can't help you. Those people that hurt us," he hesitated. What he had to tell her next could very well make her hate him, However there was no turning back now. Not if it would keep her safe. "I was just like them. I rode around killing and raping. I thought nothing of taking a woman in front of her husband and leaving them for dead. I liked it. I was good at it." Methos turned away from her and leaned forward toward the fire, his arm bracing him against the hearth.

Fiona tried to absorb his words as she stared at his back. It just didn't match the man she'd just spent the past 60 years with. It didn't match the man who had held her for the past two night when she woke screaming from her nightmares, and the man who'd dried her tears when she though she didn't have any more left to cry out.

"No," she protested, refusing to believe that of him.

"Oh yes," he corrected turning to look at her. "In fact. I was worse than du Prix and I enjoyed it just as much," he told her. He had to make her go with Darius. He had to make her leave him. He turned back to the fire, he couldn't watch the disgust he saw growing in her expression.

"You bastard," she cried." "You saw what they did to me. How could you do anything like that and like it?" she tried to understand. Hoping she was wrong.

"Because I could. Because I *liked* the domination. I *liked* the fear I saw in them," he explained, his voice cracking as he finished.

When she heard his voice break, she knew he suffered from his past and what he'd done. No matter how repulsed she was by *who* he'd been and *what* he'd done, he was hurting and she was a healer.

"Methos," she whispered loud enough for him to her, as she climbed out of bed and padded across the room toward him, pushing all her own pain and repulsion deep inside.. When she reached him, she slid under his raised arm, forcing him to back away from the hearth and look at her.

"How can you even look at me?" he asked quietly, amazed that she still came to him after all he'd told her.

"Because you're not like them. Not any more. And the fact you can be horrified by it now proves my point." She reached up to caress his cheek before taking his hand and leading him back to their bed, so that they might find the warmth and comfort to help them through the night terrors when they came.

~~~~~

"He slipped off in the middle of the night and left me to go to Paris with Darius. I hated him for leaving me like he had. I hated him for leaving me with a Christian and a part of me hated him for what he'd been. It took several years and many an argument with Darius for me to forgive him and see what he'd done had been good for me."

Joe laughed at the thought of Fiona and the old priest, "You and Darius must have made quite a pair..."

"Yeah. Can you just see a druid priestess and a catholic priest traveling together? We did nothing but fight, or rather I yelled and Darius just sat there calmly and listened to me rage until I'd worn myself out and then we'd talk. I had 600 years of hatred for Christians to let go of before I could even look at him as a friend. Darius helped me past the hatred. He helped me recover mentally from what du Prix had done to me. I like to think in some way during the years of friendship he and I had that I helped him as well."

Joe knew she was thinking of Darius when she paused. Over the years he'd learned just how good of friends they were. The chronicles recorded their meetings over the centuries but they never scratched the surface of what had become their friendship.

Fiona continued, "I think after the first two years I stopped hating Methos for leaving me. Darius helped me to understand a lot by telling me about who he had been and the horrors that he lived and relived in his own nightmares. He taught me a lot about the power of forgiveness and redemption. I eventually forgave Methos for his past, for leaving me, and through Darius, I came to understand and believe that you can rewrite who you are if you have the desire to do so. I've seen the desire in Methos hundreds of times over the centuries so how can I condemn him for something that happened 2000 years ago.

Joe now understood her reaction, or lack there of, at the news about Methos' past. "Did you and Methos ever talk about what happened to the two of you?" Joe inquired.

"Once. He told me long afterwards what happened to us was the gods extracting their revenge for the man he had been." Fiona told him

"What do you think?"

"Only the gods know the answer to that. And only Methos knows what he believes in his soul. It's not for me to judge him, especially since I have my own sins and ghosts."

"MacLeod thinks he'll rejoin Kronos..."

"No!" she interrupted. "I don't, won't believe that. He's been a doctor more times than can be counted and just by the fact he's kept himself hidden, letting Methos become a myth, I know he won't. It's not who he is anymore. He worked long and hard to not be that person any more."

"Easy Honey." Joe smoothed running, his hands up and down her arms, calming her. He wondered if Methos knew how much she believed in him. "I hope if he does have an agenda he lets us in on what he's planning."

"Me too." Fiona replied quietly, "me too." She knew Methos always had a plan and hoped that what ever was about to be played out, he'd have the time to make it a good one.

Joe knew she was exhausted. She'd been tired when she arrived back from her trip several hours earlier. He also knew her telling about what happened in the past had put her through the emotional wringer and she was now tapped out.

"Sleep honey," he whispered as he helped her settle into a more comfortable position. He needed to lock up and get cleaned up before he could join her.

~~~~~

Fiona had decided to accompany Joe to the bar when she couldn't reach Methos by phone. She needed something to do to keep her distracted and this time the calming effect of working in the garden wouldn't help. It would only give her time to think and that was the last thing she needed to do right now. She needed interaction with people. Joe was already in his office when she caught up to him. He stood in the open doorway holding a small dagger in one hand and a note in the other.

"Joe?" Fiona questioned watching him weight the dagger in his hand.

"It's from Methos." He stated handing her both the dagger and the note. "I found it on the office door."

Fiona took both from him, turning the dagger over in her hand. She recognized it. She'd given it to him one year, joking about him adding it to the arsenal of weapons he always seemed to have hidden on his person.

The note, written in the familiar half-legible scrawl, simply stated:

 

Keep Fee out of this. She's too important to both  
of us to risk her getting involved and possibly killed.

 

"Of all the meddlesome..." Fiona started to complain.

"He's right. I don't want you involved either." Joe whispered. He'd been worried she would get some hair-brained idea to go off and try to help Methos and get herself killed in the process. She was no match for the game he had a hunch would be played out before this was all over.

Fiona wanted to argue the point. She didn't like other people making decisions for her, but one look at Joe's face and the worry etched in his expression quelled any complaints she might have about he and Methos taking the decision out of her hands. This time she'd let them have their way. She had long since learned which battles to fight.

 

EPILOGUE:

Ten days later, Duncan called and told them it was over. He'd filled them in on the details of the deaths of the other three horsemen and finished by telling them Methos had left. Disappeared.

Fiona and Joe caught the first flight they could get to Paris, via Heathrow, where Duncan agreed to meet them since they both had residences there. Fiona planned to deplane in London and catch a train to Wales. She had a hunch she was following and she wanted to see if she was right.

~~~~~

"You know if you are going to run off and brood, you could at least pick someplace where you can't be found." Fiona teased when she got close enough for him to hear her above the sound of the crashing surf. He'd already alerted to her presence long before she reached the rocky coastline.

"Only you would know to look her for me here. Is this your first stop?" he asked when she was almost upon him.

"First stop. And I'm glad I was right. Even though a trip to Tibet or Nepal would have been nice. I doubt Joe would have let me. He's feeling protective and I had a hard enough time convincing him to let me come here alone." She smiled and allowed herself to be scooped up in a big bear hug.

He released her, "How is he?" he asked. He knew his friend had been sitting on a fence as to what to feel and think about what was going on.

"Glad it's over. Glad he was right about you doing the right thing."

"Good." Methos acknowledged. Wrapping her hand in the crook of his arm, he guided them down the shoreline.

After a while, Methos stopped and turned to look out over the water before finally breaking the silence they had been walking in. "Thank you."

Fiona had pulled up beside him and stood close enough to barely touch his shoulder. "For what?"

He turned and reached out, running the back of his fingers down her cheek. "For staying out of it. For staying safe. Kronos made Jacques look like a saint. He would have had no qualms about using you to get to me and then permanently killing you, and maybe Joe, afterward."

Fiona, knowing Methos rarely showed his true feelings, moved into the caress briefly to acknowledge it before letting him off the hook. "I had no other choice, Joe would have hog-tied me to the bed if I had even looked like I was going to get involved."

Methos laughed and reached out to pull his old friend close for a hug before letting her go so they could continue their walk down the coast. They could go back to Paris to meet up with Joe and MacLeod in a few days.

Finis


End file.
